July 03, 2014

Column: As Obamacare Goes, So Goes Obama

It's no accident that Obamacare has become emblematic of the Obama administration overall, because it exemplifies so thoroughly what Obama represents ideologically and functionally.

Obamacare symbolizes government largesse, incompetence, inefficiency, arrogance and heartlessness, a government that knows better than you what is good for you. It epitomizes staggering spending, waste and debt. It typifies a government that is too big for its britches, which is crushing your liberties while telling you that it has your best interests at heart and that you can't live without it. It stands for wholesale dishonesty -- something that is entirely different from what it pretends to be and what we were told it would be.

President Obama has come to personify these very traits, so it is only fitting that Obamacare has fixed itself to him as he fixed himself to it. He personally represents government largesse, incompetence (except for his consummate skill at advancing statism), arrogance, someone who knows better than you do what is good for you, someone who recklessly spends the nation's resources with no apparent concern for citizens' will or their financial well-being, a man who is subordinating (and thus destroying) our freedoms to his ideology, and someone who is fundamentally dishonest with the American people. Through his arbitrary and capricious implementation of Obamacare, among other things, President Obama is also showing us his singular propensity for lawlessness.

As Obamacare goes, so goes Obama, and lately the verdicts on Obamacare have been horrendous. It's no accident that Obama's approval ratings are in the toilet right along with his "signature achievement."

Fifty-seven percent of Americans, according to a Kaiser Family Foundation poll, say Obamacare isn't working as planned. Americans are also finally waking up to the fact that Obama isn't working out as they planned, either, as his approval ratings are lower than ever and he is seen as the worst president since World War II, which is generous.

A new chapter in the Obamacare debacle could be written every week without any fear of redundancy. According to Breitbart, the Department of Health and Human Services is reporting that the Obama administration has yet to determine whether 1,295,571 of the 8 million Obamacare enrollees are lawfully in this country. Further, we are now learning that federal officials are unable to resolve 85 percent of the 2.9 million "inconsistencies" on the Obamacare applications despite nine months of trying. It's as if a demon has burrowed its way into every fiber of the law to undermine it; others might prefer to think of it as an angel of mercy coming to our rescue by showcasing just some of the insoluble issues associated with this nightmare legislation. Only 425,000 of the 2.9 million problematic applications have been resolved, according to reports from states and the federal exchange. In some 77 percent of the applications being examined, federal records differ from what applicants submitted
on their qualifications.

These aren't just inconsequential glitches. This week, a Las Vegas cancer patient, Linda Rolain, an Obamacare enrollee, passed away at her home because of problems and delays with her application. As Steven Ertelt of LifeNews.com observed, "this is one of the forms rationing takes -- when government bureaucracy fails to get it right and provide the lifesaving medical care and treatment patients need."

As we are now seeing with the Department of Veterans Affairs, this situation will only get worse as Obamacare gets in full operational swing and crowds out the private insurance market and the government assumes greater control.

We tried to tell you Obama was serious when he said that his ultimate aim was single-payer, socialized medicine and that the left would just have to be patient for it to arrive incrementally. Those of you who insist that Obama not be held accountable for his own words will eventually have to eat yours, as we are seeing more proof with each passing day that this is precisely the direction we are headed.

Ezekiel Emanuel, a key former adviser behind Obamacare, predicted that the traditional role of health insurers would be "dead" by 2025. This isn't just the grandiose prediction of a gloating Obama statist. An S&P Capital IQ report predicts that 90 percent of Americans who now have employer-sponsored coverage will lose it by 2020 and will have to turn to government exchanges for policies.

In the meantime, Obamacare is costing the government way more than projected, and insurers are continuing to raise their premiums. In New York's Obamacare exchange alone, insurers are seeking an average 12 percent rate hike for individual plans.

In addition, Obamacare is fueling the left's war on religious liberty, and the Supreme Court's narrowly tailored rejection of its mandate for employers to subsidize abortifacients in the Hobby Lobby case is now fueling the left's malicious and fraudulent claims that Republicans are conducting a war on women.

Nothing good is coming from this miserable law, except perhaps that it is accelerating people's learning curve about Obama's true intentions and his underlying character.